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New Year's Party 911

2002-01-03 - 2:29 a.m.

I had a very long New Year's eve. The catering was great... only one noise complaint that night from the motel... and bringing the computer for watching South Park and movies on DVD worked out very nicely. Considering who all was there and the spaghetti-code-like tangle of past, present, and potential relationships among everyone there, there was very little drama.

Instead of having a bit of ice in one of the showers, we built an ice igloo from ice blocks from two grocery stores (two to get enough non-broken blocks).

I didn't get to spend a lot of time with my cuddle-friend, but I wasn't expecting to either.

The motel did screw up our request for connecting rooms, which made us more visible, as the actual party required

two rooms to hold it all. The fondue and sandwiches were yummy. We had a record (I think) 21 attendees, 17 spending the night in our 4 rooms.

The morning of the first was when things started really getting interesting. My left-front tire had gone completely flat. While I was realising I had another dumb donut spare (smaller spare for temporary use only), someone had the brilliant idea of smashing a few of the ice blocks in the parking lot... then suddenly most of the ice blocks were on their way out to the parking lot. They weren't being broken near any of the cars, and the closest cars were our own.

I decided I was very tired, and wanted to spend an extra night in the main room. Debbie and Nick agreed to stay too, so I extended that room. While the ice was being smashed in the parking lot, I got a call from the hotel. "I know you extended this room for another night, but please come and get your money. You have to leave."

I hadn't realised they had already called in a 911 emergency.

I apologized and got the amount credited back to my card. On the way back to the motel room to collect my stuff, I saw the first police car pull up. Three arrived in total. It seems they had gotten a call that a gang of young, rowdy, drunk people were lobbing large blocks of ice at other people's parked cars!

I answered questions, with a little help from my friends. The officer was rather surprised to hear that we had stopped breaking ice in the parking lot when asked, and that we were already preparing to leave. I'm sure she could also tell that we were not drunk (none of us had drank that day, and only a few toasted the new year with the tiny amount of alcohol that was there), and not particularly rowdy.

They videotaped the whole scene as we cleaned up the room, did a walk-through with the manager, and collected our stuff. One friend stayed with me to make sure they were done with me. The officer who questioned me went off with the manager to talk to her and most likely file a false 911 charge against the motel. That probably won't look good to the manager's employers.

We made sure it was okay for me to leave, and my friend and I got in my car to leave. The battery was dead. We called a friend who was waiting to meet up with us nearby, and they came and gave me a jump start. I'll bet the footage would be funny to watch... I wish I could get my hands on it. I did get a picture of two officers next to the video car.

We got my tire patched, met the others from breakfast, said our good-byes, and checked into the motel next door. I rested and tried to sleep a bit. Later on, I went to get the car so we could bring in the computer and VCR and watch more movies. Battery dead again.

After another jump start, a trip to Sears for a charge, and very yummy Indian food, we went back to the motel and watched movies until late... woke up today and watched another movie... got a call from a potential employer, and set up an interview for tomorrow at 10am! We loaded stuff into the car... guess what! The battery was dead.

I called AAA for a jump start, called my mechanic for advice, and decided to drive home and disconnect the battery overnight. We took Nick home, got food, and hung out at Debbie's house for a while, with the battery disconnected. Connected it again, and it worked! Now the car is home, battery disconnected again, waiting to spirit me off to my interview in the morning. :) I'm getting up early, just in case.

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